Climate change and displacement

Overview

Over the past 10 years, climate change has displaced an average of 70,000 people, every day. This, according to figures from the UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR. Poorer countries are particularly hard hit. There is no universal legal framework that would offer these people protection. Climate-induced displacement is not recognised as a valid ground for asylum under the Geneva Convention. Now, three countries in Latin America, the Pacific and Asia are responding to an emergency that directly affects each of them.